Once casual wear, parachute pants are now making a dramatic fashion statement. With celebrities like Kendall Jenner and Hailey Bieber making it their go-to casual pick, these pants have now snowballed into a bigger fashion trend, finding their way into the wardrobe of many youngsters in the city.
Ishana Yadav saw her favourite model Bella Hadid wearing parachute pants and absolutely fell in love with it. “I usually team it up with a crop top or tube top. It gives a cool casual and carefree vibe to it. It’s a wardrobe staple for me,” says Yadav, who works as a community manager and moonlights as a model.
It’s popularly assumed that parachute pants evolved from cargo pants. However, the basic difference between the two is that unlike the structured, utility-influenced cargo pants, parachute pants have a loose, drawstring fit at the ankle. Even though Yahvi Chavan, being a dancer, loves cargo pants, she has acquired a liking for parachute pants recently. “I keep track of the trends that the fashion celebrities follow and saw many international celebrities on TikTok and Instagram reels wearing and styling them. That is the reason it became so popular,” says Chavan. She further adds, “Being a petite person gives a good shape to my body. If it is styled with a corset, it could rightly accentuate your waistline.”
Meant for a casual look, you don’t have to dress it down all the time. And Kay Reynolds, a style and fashion Consultant from London who is currently living in Bengaluru, tells us how. “I’m almost 40 and I still love these pants as much as I did in my 20s – I style them with heeled boots to elongate my legs and to be able to take them from day to night. You can also add a bodysuit with lace trims to add a feminine touch, a delicate corsage around my neck to balance out the heaviness of the pants, and a cropped shirt as an overlayer to add some edginess.”
Coming from luxury labels, like Stella McCartney, these pants are easily available at various street-style brands. Mostly found in grunge colours, with popular colours being greys and silver, you can also up the style quotient and break the monotony by picking them in bright colours, like what Aishwarya Baruah, a fashion model by profession, did. “I am a huge fan of casual styles, and parachute pants perfectly fit well with my style. However, I didn’t want to pick the same regular colours, instead, I went for a florescent green. I usually team it up with a black basic top,” says Baruah.
In the past
In the early 1980s, when tight fits were ruling the fashion trend, parachute pants became a fad in the US as part of the increased popularity of break dancing. The pants were usually referred to as the pants’ made of nylon material, similar to a parachute, hence the name.